About Me

My name is Eve Estes and I’m an alcoholic. Except my name’s not Eve. This is an anonymous blog. Does that make this AAA?!
My intention in writing is to navigate a path towards recovery from addiction, trauma and mental illness, and a life lived ‘wrong’ in the most general of senses.
The main focus is to document my experience of trying to manage my alcoholism from a ‘harm-reduction’ based perspective, as opposed to an abstinence-based model. The World Health Organisation defines Harm Reduction as: ‘Policies, programmes and practices that aim primarily to reduce the adverse consequences of the use of legal and illegal drugs without necessarily reducing consumption.’ In my case, however, I will most certainly be aiming to dramatically reduce my consumption.
My plan is to record my thoughts and experiences as I walk, one day at a time and not always forwards, towards a better relationship with both alcohol and myself. Basically this is a last, desperate intervention before I face the fact that alcohol and I simply cannot co-exist. It is also a proposed pre-emptive strike at all the shit that I anticipate will rise to the surface if I start trying, on occasion, NOT to drink.
One of my frequent complaints, however, is that I hate being put into boxes. I am refusing, therefore, to put this blog into a box. I wear many labels, and, if I was to use my ‘full title’, I guess I’d be an Alcoholic, with Generalised Anxiety Disorder and Bipolar II Disorder. I am also a Mother and Step-Mother living in a blended multi-lingual family who lives abroad. I blog about all of these topics, sometimes focusing on one, but more often writing about them in the way that I live them. All at the same time. We are not box-shaped.
I am sharing my stories in the belief that storytelling heals, both the one who tells and the one who listens.
Please don’t hesitate to contact me if you wish to share your story, I am happy to consider guest articles from fellow bloggers too, just send them over 🙂